Phoenix Child
by FroggyFeet
Summary: There was an unfinished carving under his bed. Who would feed the ducks on the lake? Who was going to tell Malik he was being a rock again, and who was going to tell Altair that the concubines in the garden are making bets on whether or not he died this time? He needed to get back. And he would. He was an assassin.


AN: Got a kind of Kadar obsession right now. It's Complicated has me thinking up things to progress the story [its looking like a long one, folks] and well. Yeah. It got into this. I don't even know. I think maybe my romance Muse has kind of set itself on fire and run away. And well, that just leaves the crazy Muse. Good luck with that. Ha-ha. Happy Reading!

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_"For a seed to achieve its greatest expression, it must come completely undone. The shell cracks, its insides come out and everything changes. To someone who doesn't understand growth, it would look like complete destruction."_

_ ― Cynthia Occelli_

Kadar felt more than saw the hands.

He did what he usually did whenever his brother or Altair or even one of the novices had him pinned in the practice ring. He played dead. The men he knew, calloused hands hard with the swords and bows they practiced with, growled and muttered with the weight. A small victory. He tucked it away, knowing full well that it was only the beginning. The Templars were known for their cruelty when it came to Assassins. It didn't matter.

He was an Al-Sayf.

It wasn't going to change a thing.

They dumped him in the room, a room that had a history. Even he could tell, even he could smell the remains of previous occupants, tight and cloying. Only a small window, high up on the blackened wall to give a prisoner hope for clean air. It would break them, eventually. The idea of freedom, so close and so far. It wouldn't get to him. He refused. It wouldn't have broken Malik, the tiny voice at the back of his head says, even when the hands leave and he is alone.

It wouldn't have broken Altair.

It wouldn't have broken Malik.

Kadar swallowed the grim knowledge happily, that he wasn't either of them. That he would most probably die here, in the dark, useless to his own cause. In the end, he would end the same way most did. Malik was probably already mourning him, already setting out the funeral whites. Altair. Creed knew what the Eagle was doing. His brother was predictable, he would probably already be waging war on Altair, ignoring his own faults. Altair would be fighting back, and the usual dance would begin.

Kadar found it in him to laugh.

Without him, maybe they would actually kill each other this time.

He looked up, at that window far away.

He wasn't going to die here.

He still had things to do, people to see, tea to blend.

There was an unfinished carving under his bed. Who would feed the ducks on the lake? Who was going to tell Malik he was being a rock again, and who was going to tell Altair that the concubines in the garden are making bets on whether or not he died this time? He needed to get back. And he would. He was an assassin.

xxx

While he was alone, he questioned. Why keep him? Did they like the idea of a pet assassin? The idea of a de-clawed cat in their home? Cats still had teeth. They still hunted. One of the cats in the village -belonged to one of the fishing families there- didn't have claws. It somehow became the best hunter; always was there a dead present at the door of its house come dawn. Kadar did'nt delude himself. He knew that he would get out or die trying. He didn't claw at the walls, but he did dig. With bones, with broken pieces of the people before. They wouldn't need them now.

Apparently he had already been de-clawed. He guessed it was the novice greys that kept his hands untied, which kept him from being in the dungeon proper. It wasn't until he stopped playing dead and stood beside the door that he heard the screaming, the hiss of hot metal and the ripping from a cell down the hall. A small, dark part of him growls, _at least while they're there they aren't here_. Later, he could be disgusted at how selfish that thought was. Not now. Not when the keys were already jangling in a Templar fist and the screams had melted into sobs.

A small, almost gone voice in his head frowned at him. You are not alone. A flicker of two men in white was in his minds eye, and he held his makeshift weapon tighter. He was never really alone.

Later he could be disgusted at how he had stepped over his own Brothers to survive. It was funny, how he would step over one while he clung to the assassin whites of another. Two others, really. Later. He could be disgusted at how he had-

The door opened.

Kkk

He was surprised how easy it was.

The sharpened leg bone worked like a charm, and absently, as Kadar walked down the thin, narrow halls, Kadar wondered why they sent the one man. He was an assassin. The greys that had collared him into washing and cleaning duties in Masayaf had managed to ready the door to freedom in Jerusalem. He had been clean, quick, like Altair had taught him. The guard hadn't even stained the uniform with his blood. Kadar pulled him in quick, swapped clothes even faster, and had rubbed the dusted bone on his face that wasn't covered by a Templar helm. He did what Malik taught him. Blend, hide in plain sight. He was out of the main keep within the hour.

It wasn't hard to pocket a knife.

A short sword.

It wasn't even hard to dump the Templar uniform.

He stole a tunic from a washing line in Jerusalem. And did what Al-Mualim had told every novice. Drilled it into them from the beginning. In the big wide world, when you find yourself in a city, find a bureau. It wasn't hard. He took to the rooftops, quiet and laughably undetectable. The guards were jittery, but they didn't take notice of anything that wasn't white. That small part of him smiled; the part of him that was proud that his Brothers were so prominent. It meant that all the Templars ever looked for was a man in white, talons a-shine in the burning sun. They never looked closer.

He stole again.

He should have felt worse about it. Before the Temple, he would have. He settled into a roof garden, and for a crazy few moments, when there was warm bread in his stomach and a light wine in hand, surrounded by wild flowers and hidden behind the large swathes of linen, he felt safe. He allowed the delusion, this time. He knew all it took was a Templar, a Guard, someone with the initiative to look instead of _just see_, and he would be caught. He might get off lucky and get a hand cut off for being a thief.

He didn't ask why that made him smile.

He dropped through the lattice roof with ease, already laughing through the phrase, stepping through the door. And there they were, fists already in each others clothes, bloodied and torn up. They were snarling, just like cats fighting for territory. Kadar hoped they didn't pee on walls like cats. He told them so. They didn't laugh like he did; they were staring at him as if he were Allah or some kind of spirit.

Malik moved first, and Kadar noticed the empty sleeve.

Altair moved second, and Kadar noticed his legendary ego was missing.

"Safety and Peace, brothers."

xxx

"I saw you die."

Kadar picked the teacup from the table, shrugging nonchalantly. "They hit me hard, but when I woke up I was already in… Well. It doesn't-" Malik fully growled, eyes flashing the way they did when Altair swapped his tea for opium leaves. "It does matter."

Altair pulled his hood back, and levelled him with that golden stare. "How did you escape?"

Kadar smiled. "They saw the novice greys and left me in lesser security. I was in a cell where they hadn't removed the previous inhabitants, and I did what I had to. Made a blade from a bone and stole the jailer's uniform. Snuck out."

"Solomon's Temple happened three months ago, Kadar. Where… What…" Malik frowned, and Kadar simply pressed harder against his brother's side. The older of the two had barely even blinked, always having the hand or a leg on him lest he disappear. The younger frowned, "I don't know. I know I have been free for a few weeks, at least. Maybe more. I've not had a good track of time while I've been… gone."

Altair leant forward, "You're the reason why there are less abused citizens in this city, aren't you?"

Kadar's eyes flashed.

The eagle's eyebrows quirked, "You've been cleaning up while I've been here. I noticed that there were less instances of the guards attacking civilians, but I didn't know why. That was you, wasn't it? You've been here, working under both Templar and Brotherhood scrutiny, and completely baffling both. The people only talk of a beggar that randomly deals out vigilante justice, but never gets caught. Lays down at least ten men before disappearing."

The boy had it in him to look sheepish.

"Things have been… strange since I escaped. It only feels like a few days, but yes. I've been helping here and there. I was drunk most of the time, to be honest. I figured I would do what I could before I made the trek back to Masayaf."

"Why didn't you come back sooner?"

Kadar actually had it in him to laugh.

xxx

Altair couldn't find it in him to be surprised. He wondered when that smile would crack, as sad as that was. It was about a week later, when Malik had actually managed to let the boy out of his sight. Altair had found a lead on one of his targets, Majd Addin, and had acted accordingly. It was by chance that he crossed a wandering Templar. It was sudden, even by Assassins standards. Kadar was gone from his side, already landing on the Templar's chest like a wolf, not flying but leaping. His dagger, one that he had stolen during his incarceration, was already in the mans throat, already tearing flesh. It wasn't the twist of a novice. It was one of a torturer. Kadar was already standing, leaving the gurgling mess of a man behind, and Altair finally saw exactly how Kadar had lost the last few months.

xxx

The eagle was used to walking in on things he would have rather avoided. The bureau was a hornet's nest for nearly everyone who came to visit. Malik was angry at him, Kadar was angry full stop, and Altair just had to watch as the three of them became such an acrid force that even when the wounded or tired informants wandered in, they left soon after and usually without aid.

"It must have been nice, thinking that I was at peace and in Heaven, brother."

"I saw you die. So I believed that. Yes Kadar."

"So why are you staring at me like I am a stranger?"

"You are my brother, Kadar, no stranger."

"In the early days, I bet you wished that I came back. The same way we both did after Baba died. That we both came back and didn't leave you alone. Well Malik, I'm back. But all I see is that same loss, like you've just lost someone again. You knew that if I came back I wouldn't be Kadar anymore. And I'm not," the boy shrugged, "The same way that you are not the same. You used to be different. Have more of a twinkle in your eyes. Now all I see is hate, and pain, and that's not okay. But that isn't all there is. My Malik is in there, I know that." Kadar stepped closer, eyes meeting his brothers with a fire that the Eagle recognised as a familiar trait. But it wasn't entirely Malik he saw in the boy; the fire was twisted, painful, like water. Churning oceans instead of roiling flame. "So why can't you see your Kadar in me?"

"All I can see is my brother who I failed to protect. A shell of a boy who used to wear his heart on his sleeve. I cannot see into you the way I used to. We are both different, Kadar. You don't want people to see, and yet you blame me for not wanting to look. We both know that if things hadn't-"

"But they did. And we both know what would have happened if they didn't."

"Kadar…"

"We both know what it is like to step over someone else to survive, Malik."

Altair tried to back up, tried to run. It wasn't something that he was proud of, but he wasn't stupid. It would be downright idiocy to step into that room now, between the two of them. He knew that Kadar had done so many times, but he wasn't Kadar.

The thought stopped him.

Slowly, he pressed forwards until he was in the doorway, the sun beating his back. Kadar barely glanced at him, away from the silent, almost vacant Malik. The heavy, unspoken words were suffocating. _You left me there to die. _Altair knew, from those sharp blue eyes, that the condemnation wasn't just for Malik.

xxx

The tea was already cold by the time Malik stepped into the back room, eyes flickering between Altair, slumped on a cushion in the corner, and Kadar, stood to stare out the window. "Thank you."

The words made both Dai and Assassin look to the boy, who still hadn't turned around. The edges of pink scars were barely visible along the nape of his neck, ominously disappearing underneath the tunic that Kadar had returned in. He had flat out refused to go to the public baths, instead disappearing at dawn every few days to clean himself up. The long sleeves he always wore now were similar in their now familiarity. The kid was rarely ever seen without clothes now, always those soft gloves, hiding the harsh pink burns underneath.

Neither Altair nor Malik knew how the boy still smiled.

It wasn't the same, but it wasn't bad, either.

"If I was somebody else, I wouldn't have gotten out of there alive. Because if I was somebody else, I wouldn't have met either of you." the boy's words didn't hold that fake, happy lilt that had become the norm. They were sure, but quiet. Honest. The mask Kadar had set up was falling away. "If I hadn't met either of you, I'd still be in that tower. I wouldn't be free. I'd be a pet, at best. A dog or a cat, kept like a disposable source of comfort. There to be kicked, thrown, hurt, starved. But I told myself quite a few lies in there. Told myself that everything would be okay, that I'd stand up and be free one day. Told myself that neither of you would have lain down nor died. But I am not either of you," the boy shrugged. "I am not a master assassin; I'm barely out of my greys. But I survived. And without you two I wouldn't have. I wouldn't have found it in me to fight back. Hell, after watching you two for years, I know how to fight like a wild dog." a short, harsh laugh followed. A light, almost content sigh was close on its heels. "The world is ugly, cruel and bitter. But," Kadar shrugged, "It is also beautiful."

Kadar turned, eyes downcast. Not in subservience, nor in shame. The quirk of his mouth, the twist of his brow; _relief_. "And being outside, in the sunshine and getting to feed the ducks again. I'm happy."

The eyes, the same sky blue that made the other novices pick on him, shone.

"I'm sorry I left you both alone so long."

Altair was barely able to keep his head.

"But I'm back now."

You could almost hear the cracking in Malik's throat.

"And I won't leave you alone again."

_I promise._


End file.
